


Rent Day Blues

by akire_yta, breeisonfire, Heavenward (PreludeInZ)



Series: Rent Day Blues [1]
Category: Thunderbirds
Genre: F/M, I will put more tags here later but it's 1:30AM and this is an impulse, first responders AU, poor!AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-06
Updated: 2019-05-22
Packaged: 2020-02-27 01:17:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18728737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akire_yta/pseuds/akire_yta, https://archiveofourown.org/users/breeisonfire/pseuds/breeisonfire, https://archiveofourown.org/users/PreludeInZ/pseuds/Heavenward
Summary: What if the Tracys were poor? What if they were all various shades of first responder? What if this three way round robin got picked back up by its writers? Absolutely no promises on that last one. Piece is unfinished but I suspect we're all still damn proud of it, so here it is for Ao3's consumption! Enjoy.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Don't ya'll get too excited. I'm just putting this up for archival purposes.

John had to pause on the fourth floor landing, willing his leaden muscles to hold it together for just a few more minutes of effort before they gave up completely.

In his ears, he could still hear the echo of voices, a thousand panicked phone calls, a thousand personal disasters, all asking, pleading, demanding he help them.

It had been a busy shift.

Steadying himself on the railing, John forced himself up the final flight of steps.

Inside, Alan was on the couch, his racing game blaring out of the tinny television speakers propped up on the rickety table in the corner. As the cars squealed and the virtual spectators squealed, John winced. “Turn that down, Alan.”

Alan didn’t take his eyes off the screen. “Good evening to you too,” Alan said sarcastically. “Two seconds between arrival and bawling me out, that must be a record.”

John ignored him, too tired to argue. “Where’s Grandma?”

“Napping,” Alan replied, cursing and jolting himself almost off the couch as he tried to make his avatar on screen respond fast enough. “Is she ever anywhere else?"

John shook his head – how she could sleep in this noise, he had no idea. As expected, she was sitting up in bed, reading. “Hey Grandma, how you feeling?”

She looked a little pale, rheumy around the eyes. “Storm’s a-comin’, Johnny,” she said, laying her book on her lap.

“How bad’s the pain?"he asked, already mentally running through his checklist.

She waved him off. "You’re worse than Gordon. You’ve off duty, relax, put your feet up, I’ll cook.”

John caught her in time to stop her tumbling off the edge of the bed as the pain hit, and eased her back to sitting. “We need to get you a new hip,” he murmured, mostly to himself.

She waved him off, lips thin with pain. “Don’t waste money on things that don’t keep,” she chided.

John stroked her hair off her temples. “I’ve got dinner, you rest up.

He managed to keep the reassuring smile on his face until he closed her door behind him.

In the short hallway, between the room Alan and Grandma shared and the one he and Virgil and Scott managed to rotate through, the sound of the game was head-thumpingly loud. "Alan,” John snapped. “Turn that off and do your homework.”

No response.

John stalked through the open door into the tiny sitting room off the kitchenette. The game on the TV was repeating its title screen music. The couch was empty, the front door open.

John slumped against the door frame and massaged his temples for a moment before he pulled his phone out of his pocket. He still had a few texts left for this month.  _Alan’s gone, again_  he texted the group.

He couldn’t leave Grandma alone. And if Alan didn’t want to be found, he wouldn’t be found.

John turned on the stove, began boiling water. They had some pasta in the cupboard, a tin of tuna. And grandma had been losing weight, she needed to eat.

The front door opened as he dumped the last of the pasta into the boiling pot. “In here,” he called out.

* * *

These days, Virgil was convinced the smell of smoke clung to him constantly.

He knew it wasn’t true. He’d taken a shower at the station before leaving, his clothes had been tucked away in his locker the entire shift. There was no reason he should still be able to smell it.

But he did.

Every step was a battle, one that was harder that day than most. He’d been pulled aside by the chief near the end of his shift and informed that his schedule had been switched around, he was being forced to take the next week off. Paid vacation, the chief had been quick to add, but time off nonetheless.

 _“You’re burning out, kid,”_  the chief had said. *“You can’t keep taking on those extra hours. This a job where you can’t afford to not be at your best. Now, you’ve got eleven days of vacation days all together. I won’t make you take all of them, but you’re not going to be on the schedule for the next seven. Get some rest, go hang out with some buddies. Get your mind out of the station. It’s for your own good.” *

Virgil had tried to explain to him that he volunteered for those extra hours because they needed that money. The time-and-a-half overtime rate was worth every bit of exhaustion he had to fight through if it meant they could afford to pay rent or eat. All of them took on extra hours. He could handle it. The chief had seemed sympathetic, but hadn’t changed his mind.

So Virgil was sent home. It was a school night, so theoretically Alan should be home, but he wasn’t counting on that. Grandma would of course be there. He couldn’t remember if any of his brothers were off.

His phone went off as he walked towards the door of their apartment building and he pulled it off, noting as he did so that the crack on the screen had somehow gotten worse, and grimaced.

_Alan’s gone, again._

Virgil looked up and scanned around him, trying to see if he could spot Alan anywhere in the crowd. He doubted he would, because Alan was very good at disappearing, but he still had to make sure.

He found nothing, unsurprisingly, and tried not to groan as he entered the building and walked up the stairs. Stairs. He hated stairs. He hated elevators more (and specifically having to free people from them). But still.  _Stairs._

He unlocked the front door and heard John call from the kitchen. “In here!”

John sounded just as tired as Virgil felt, if not more so. He was standing at the stove, making pasta, and looked up when Virgil walked in.

“Hey,” Virgil said.

“Hey,” John nodded. “See Alan on your way in?”

“No,” Virgil said. “I looked, but, well—”

_Alan’s difficult._

John exhaled slowly. “Yeah.”

“Scott’s gonna be pissed,” Virgil said, leaning against the wall. “How’s Grandma?”

He already knew the answer. She was in pain, sick, and losing weight. Gordon worked as a paramedic at the same station Virgil worked at, and he’d stopped by Virgil’s truck before he was officially on shift and expressed his worries to him. In his own irritated, sarcastic way. In short, she needed more care than they were currently able to give her with their own busy schedules and Alan’s tendency to vanish at any given moment. Gordon’s frustration with their youngest brother echoed Scott’s temper and Virgil knew it was going to come to head sometime soon. Secretly, he hoped he wasn’t there. Scott and Gordon against each other were bad enough. The two of them against Alan was going to be deafening.

“The usual,” John sighed. “She won’t say anything, but the pain’s getting worse.”

“Gordon said something similar.”  _Though with much more profanity._

“She’s still losing weight,"John continued, stirring the pasta. "I don’t know what we’re going to do for food until next week. Alan’s got school lunch and we have a little bit left in savings, but we need that. And Grandma shouldn’t be left alone, but I don’t know how we’re going to make  _that_  work, either.”

“Actually, about that,” Virgil said, and John looked at him warily. “Chief took me off rotation for the next week. Paid time off. I tried to argue, but he all but kicked me out of the station.”

He couldn’t keep the bitterness out of his tone. He knew the chief was trying to look out for him, but they were barely getting by. This was going to make things harder in the long run and Virgil knew they were going to feel it sooner rather than later.

* * *

_Alan’s gone, again._

He must have stared at his phone for a little too long, because there’d been a soft chuckle from the driver’s seat, before the comment, “More grief on the home front?”

“The home front is grief in every dimension. Up, down, front, back and sideways,” Scott answered, and snapped his phone closed, dropped it into the breast pocket of his dark blue uniform. He permitted himself a single slow breath, exhaling hard, before he snuffed out the flare of anger at his baby brother. Nothing he could do about it, in the middle of his shift. If he remembered right, John’s off, and if Virgil isn’t yet, he should be soon. Gordon’s working the night shift, the same as Scott is, but he’ll be more likely to let his frustration show than the eldest is. Scott pities anyone who expects patience out of Gordon tonight.

“Bad deal, sir. Sorry.”

“Yeah. Don’t worry about it. Gimme another ten minutes and we’ll get back to work.”

“Yessir. I’m just letting my manicure dry.”

In spite of everything, on the home front or otherwise, that gets a laugh out of him. “Right.”

He’d be alone, if she weren’t a rookie, and still in training. And she wouldn’t know enough to have asked the question, if Scott weren’t fond of her. If they hadn’t gone to get a beer after her first shift under his supervision, because he remembers his own first days on the force, and remembers swearing up and down that he’d never be such a bastard as the man who’d trained  _him_.

So, in a roundabout way, even though he’s only really known her a few weeks, he’s made a friend. And he’s glad that she’s here.

And they’re in between calls, him and Kayo, and he’s halfway through typing up the report for the domestic disturbance they’ve just broken up. His brain’s still caught in the modality of needing to translate an internal stream of frustrated profanity into polished, situationally appropriate language. They’re on the other side of the city, parked in an empty lot, and if Alan’s only just taken off, there’s no way he’s going to cross his older brother’s path.

Not that he would anyway. Short of a concerted effort to find him, when Alan takes off, it’s usually just a matter of waiting for him to come home. Anything else wastes time and resources and energy. He’s not usually gone for longer than a few hours. No longer than a night, at the worst, and those are nights he usually crashes at a friends place. It’s not that he doesn’t worry about Alan. Scott worries plenty about Alan, when Alan takes off, but the balance of probability is that Alan will be fine.

It’s the way his absence ripples through the rest of the family, because now John won’t sleep. He’ll be up all night waiting by the door, agonizing over whether or not he should try and call someone who probably won’t answer, if he’s brought his phone at all. Now Virgil will go wandering off after the youngest, peering down back alleys and sticking his head in the doors of arcades and corner stores, or approaching little knots of hooded figures, hoping one of them might be Alan. And Gordon, if Gordon gets the news, will be in a fit of black temper and distraction, when his job demands that he remain detached, impersonal, and focused.

And the worst is the way Scott has to wonder when Alan stopped caring, about the way he makes his family feel. When he stopped caring that his actions have consequences, and stopped being able to tell that his brothers are doing their best, and even if they’re failing, that they hope it counts for something.

But for now there’s nothing he can do about it, except to keep an ear on the scanner, and hope that no one picks his kid brother up tonight.

* * *

Gordon shouldn’t have his phone on him at all, but he’d caught a bleeder early in the evening, and in a lull between calls, his supervisor had jerked her thumb at the lockers and told him to clean himself up. He only glanced at his phone to check the time.

_Alan’s gone, again._

It’s the  _again_  that sets Gordon teeth into a snarl.

When had Alan’s runaway act become routine? Gordon yanked off his blood-stained top, swapped it out for a fresh uniform, his mind racing as he tugged aggressively at buttons and hooks.

This had to stop; life sucked, there was no denying that, and since Dad’s vanishing act, it had started sucking hard. But either they were all in together, or they weren’t going to make it. They needed to be able to trust each other.

Alan just needed to  _grow up._

Out in the main room, Gordon heard the phone ring, the shrill bell summoning them for another call.

Gordon slammed his locker door, hard enough to distort the cheap tin, and stalked off to his wagon.

***

Car crashes are crime scenes.

Not a lot of people knew that. But until the cause of the accident had been determined, a car crash was treated as secured until it was released by an officer.

When there were survivors, the police and the paramedics worked together, to save lives as best they could. But by the time Gordon nosed his ambulance through the ring of rubberneckers, his lights flashing off their faces, he knew it was too late.

There was an urgency when the victims were still breathing that melted away when they died.

Gordon pulled up next to the squad car, nodding at the dark-haired rookie leaning against the back bumper. “Kayo, right?”

“That’s me. You’re Tracy’s kid brother, right?” she said with an easy smile.

“Not a kid anymore. Anyone called it?”

Up close, even in the gloom, Gordon could see she was paler than usual. “There’s only one, a driver. His head was, umm?"she made a slicing gesture at neck level.

Gordon set his aching jaw. "Injuries incompatible with life.”

She blinked. “What?”

Gordon hoisted out his field kit; he knew he wouldn’t need it, but the fatality still needed to be officially called. “That’s what we call it, until the coroner report makes it official. ‘Injuries incompatible with life’.”

Kayo exhaled, hard and long. “Got it. Do you need me to?”

Gordon took pity on her; she was a rookie, and a decapitation was bad even for experienced officers. “Keep the bystanders off my ride, wouldya?” he asked with an easy grin, not waiting for a reply before he was striding towards the wreck.

Scott was in the thick of it, issuing orders, choreographing the various services who buzzed around the scene. “Hey, Scott,” Gordon greeted him, already snapping on thick latex gloves.

“Evening,” Scott nodded a greeting. “No rush,” he added thickly.

“So I heard.” He dropped his bag between his boots as he took up post next to Scott. Together, they watched the fire crew work to jam in the hydraulic jack enough to force the door open. The shattered windscreen caught and threw the red light back with a rich, oily sheen that Gordon knew presaged bad things inside. “Did you see John’s text?”

Even over the noise of the scene, Gordon heard Scott inhale through his nose.

“I guess we should be grateful he waited for John to get home, rather than bailing and leaving grandma alone,” Gordon probed carefully, watching Scott’s reaction out of the corner of his eye.

“I guess,” Scott agreed noncommittally. “He’s a good kid.”

Gordon snorted. “He’s a teenager, pissed off, and now fully aware he’s starting everything six feet behind everyone else.”

Finally, Scott looked over at him. “You were pretty pissed off at his age too, as I recall, but I don’t remember you running away all the time.”

Gordon shrugged, testing the fit of his gloves with steepled fingers. “I’m not Alan.”

“You’re not mad?”

Gordon laughed, stifling it quickly, mindful of the solemnity of the scene before them. “I’m fucking furious, and if I catch that kid, I’m putting a bell on him.” He thought for a moment. “Or maybe a leash.” His gloved hands rolled into fists, and he shook them out. “Alan needs to know that—as much as it sucks—he can’t keep taking it out on us.  _Especially_  not on Grandma.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Scott promised.

Before them, the car ripped open with a tearing of metal. Gordon waited for the sound to die. “Will he listen to you?”

“Worth a try.”

Gordon shouldered his heavy bag once more. “Except we’ve tried that, Scotty. He needs to know—what he’s doing?” Gordon paused, his mind already steeling itself for what was to come, but managed to find the thread of the end of the thought, “it’s incompatible,” he finished, the word tasting heavy on his tongue. “We can’t hold it together if he’s hell-bent on pulling us apart.”

“He’s a good kid,” Scott repeated.

Gordon snorted and turned to the wreckage, nodding at the fire chief’s beckoning wave. “Good kids can still wreck it. Just saying.” Without waiting for Scott to try and answer, Gordon clambered over the crumpled wreckage of car and bridge support, and went to confirm the end of a life.


	2. Chapter 2

If Alan heard the phrase, “Life isn’t fair,” one more time, he was going to scream.

In his experience, life sucked, and he was fully aware of the fact. He didn’t need to be told it, time and time again. It wasn’t going to make anything better, and it sure as hell wasn’t going to make him okay with what was going on. All it did was make him angrier.

No  _shit_  life isn’t fair.

He checked his watch as he ducked into the garage he’d started hanging around months before. There was only one thing he really had any skill at, and it was racing. Once upon a time, he’d dreamed of being the fastest racer in the circuit, but he wasn’t a little kid anymore. Besides, he didn’t race for the fun of it.

It was hard to explain, but behind the wheel of a good car was when he really felt alive. When the world started to make sense, where he could leave his anger behind and not have to think about anything. He didn’t have to remember that his dad had just vanished on them, or that Grandma was really sick, or that his brothers were all going to be pissed when he got home. He didn’t have to feel guilty. Nothing could touch him.

And he was good at it. Really good. As in he had a reputation now as one of the best in the area. As in some of the regulars now bet on him. He’d earned his keep.

“You’re late,” the garage owner called as he walked into the room, pulling on his gloves.

“Sorry,” Alan muttered. He didn’t bother with an excuse. This wasn’t the kind of place you brought up your home life. And how was he supposed to explain that he hadn’t left until his brother had made it home because his grandma couldn’t be alone?

“Got a big one tonight,” the owner said, tossing a set of keys at Alan. Alan caught them, inspecting them.

He didn’t know the garage owner’s real name; it didn’t seem like anyone did. Everyone in the circuit just called him the Mechanic. He’d taken a chance on Alan one day when he’d been racing his brothers’ car, and now Alan was his number one driver. In exchange, Alan didn’t ask questions, and won races. That was all that was expected. Simple.

“Aren’t they all big?"Alan asked as he pulled on his jacket. The Mechanic didn’t laugh. He never did. It was a little unnerving.

He took his red helmet off of the stand it stayed on and held it under his arm as he headed to the car for the night. Alan got to play with all sorts of different cars, all of them as amazing as the last, but his favorite was the one he’d first raced in, a Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat, souped up, modified, and gorgeous. She was as red as his helmet and as smooth a ride as he’d ever had. He didn’t care what anyone else thought about her; his record with her spoke for itself.

"Don’t lose tonight, kid,” the Mechanic said. “We’ve got some big numbers on this one. You’ll get a sizeable cut.”

Alan nodded as he climbed in. His cut went towards buying the car he was currently getting situated in. He was nowhere near getting it, but it wasn’t like he could take the money he made home. Scott was a cop, and his grandma would never accept it. They couldn’t even know about the racing. They’d kill him.

He pulled up at the usual spot, taking his place in the line before opening his window to acknowledge the starter. He closed his eyes, pushing away all of his irritation and guilt and focusing just on the race.

After that, it was just as simple as hitting the gas.

Street racing had rules, despite popular belief. They were mostly common sense: don’t race on busy streets, don’t have passengers, don’t play dirty, don’t race in an area you don’t know. Alan knew this area very well. He’d made it his business to know every inch of every possible route. It was part of his secret of success.

There was a curve at one point, and it was a nasty thing, sharp and with a ditch just off of it. Alan had seen one guy go spinning off of it (he hadn’t been the best driver, not nearly careful enough in his turns and in a car he didn’t know how to handle). He’d survived with only his ego taking a blow, but Alan lived with four emergency workers. He knew - albeit through secondhand accounts - how nasty car accidents were. And ultimately he knew that even the glory of winning wasn’t worth doing something as stupid as taking the curve too fast.

Unfortunately, that night, he seemed to be the only one who knew that. And even more unfortunately, he missed the inside. So, when the inside guy’s tires started to lose their grip on the road, Alan was the one he spun into, hitting Alan’s front right side with his back left. And Alan was the one who lost control of his car.

Alan had just enough time to think,  _Oh, shit, this is gonna hurt._ Then, nothing.

* * *

None of the others seem to understand why he goes out looking for Alan.

It’s not because he expects to find out where he  _is_. It’s because he’s trying to learn to predict where the damn kid’s gonna go. And he’s getting better. He’s gradually narrowing down a list of his little brother’s favourite haunts; knows which of them are okay, which of them are kinda sketchy, which one his little brother needs to have his ass hauled out of. He usually tags Gordon in for this duty, if he’s available, and John if he’s not. If neither of them are around, then he let’s Alan slide.

Scott should be able to figure it out, being a cop and all, but then, Scott refuses to go out for detective. He says it’s because he likes patrol work, likes being on the front line. Virgil suspects it’s got more to do with the requirement for a degree. Once upon a time that wouldn’t have stopped him.

Half the time Virgil goes out, he  _does_  find Alan. Alan will be in an empty lot, skateboarding with a handful of kids he knows from school. Or Alan will be tagging meaningless graffiti in a back alley somewhere. Or Alan will have gotten on a bus and headed downtown, and Virgil will just need to wait until the same bus brings him back again, eventually.

It’s the half the time Virgil can’t account for him that’s starting to be concerning. Because Virgil’s starting to piece together a sense of structure, around the times when his little brother takes off. There’s a pattern. It’s a pattern designed to look like randomness, but there’s a shape to the negative space around the times he can’t find his brother.

He’s pretty sure it’s got to do with the reasons his brother goes downtown.

Well.

He’s finally got the time to find out.

So when Alan’s favourite bus pulls up to the bus stop, this time, Virgil gets on. He nods to the driver and drops the fare in, and looks up with a smile he’s been told is charming. He holds up his phone, hopes the crack in the screen doesn’t obscure his brother’s face too badly, and gets straight to the point, “Hey. This is my brother. He on this route often?”

The scoff and the eyeroll are as good as a yes, and Virgil winces. “Yeah. Sorry if he's—”

He’s cut off with a grunt from the driver and the doors pull shut behind him. The older man gives him an appraising once over, challenging. “You gonna rope that kid in?”

Virgil shrugs, slips his hands into the pocket of his jacket. “If I can find him, yeah.”

A nod. “Sit up front. I’ll let you know where he usually gets off.”

“Thanks, man.”

Another grunt and the bus’s hydraulics hiss and lurch as the bus rolls away from the curb. Virgil drops his phone into his pocket and takes a seat up front.

* * *

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”

Scott rolled his eyes, clutching his paper cup like a lifeline as Gordon picked his way across the debris-strewn road towards him. “You got here quick.”

Gordon shrugged. He had a speck of blood on his sleeve, but otherwise it was hard to tell he’d been on call all evening. “Tiny little spray of rain, and every idiot in a V8 takes a header into a ditch. Was on my way back to base when I got the call. So,” he asked, eyes scanning the scene. “What have we got?”

“Kayo’s liaising with the fire service now,” Scott said, draining his coffee and crumpling the cup. “Bunch of guys street racing. High end stuff,” he added, tapping a hubcap with his boot. “From what we can get out of the few bystanders we caught, the guy on the inside lost it and wiped out the rest of his cluster. We’ve got a bunch of drivers trapped, no idea if there’s anyone seriously wounded, but from the swearing I’d say that at least the ones we’ve found are more concussions and bruises than anything.”

Gordon was already getting gloved up. “Concussion ain’t nothing to joke about, Scotty.” He grinned up at his brother, too bright in the dark night. “You should know, brother.” He rose as Scott chuckled darkly. “Point me at the victims. The other wagon was across town, they won’t be here for at least another fifteen, even with full sound and light.”

A yell further down the slope caught their attention, and they fell into step towards the hubbub without another word. “Got someone for me, Miss Kayo?”

Kayo rolled her eyes, unaffected. “A few managed to climb out once we broke the windows, but they’re all declining treatment.” Gordon made a face; Scott knew how it irritated his brother that people, hurting or in pain, were still thinking more about their insurance, or lack thereof, than their health. “Scott, these are some high end rides with a bunch of punks and street kids behind the wheel. Something’s not right here.”

Scott frowned, brow furrowing. “Well, then, probie. Go follow your nose.”

Kayo’s eyes widened almost imperceptible, but she nodded and headed off back up the slope. Gordon watched her go. “I like her.”

Scott ignored the subtle hook. “Come on, let’s find you a willing patient. Hate to have rolled you away from your midnight coffee for no good reason.”

Gordon let out a low whistle when he saw the vehicle the fire crew was working on. “Would you look at that baby. Cherry red means she goes faster,” he added as an aside.

“Fast enough to leave one hell of a dent,” Scott replied seriously, playing his torch along the gouge the crashing car had carved into the landscape.

The now-familiar sound of the hydraulic jack was followed moments later by the door popping. “Welp,” Gordon said, tugging on the strap of his kit. “They’re playing my song.”

He nodded his thanks to the fire crew, already heading off to continue stabilizing and cracking the wrecks as Gordon knelt down next to the now-open drivers seat. “Evening there, I’m Gordon. Can you tell me your—?” the words died on his lips as Gordon’s torch played over the blood-smeared face of his baby brother.

* * *

She only knows them because they live one floor up from her apartment. 501 to her 401.

The first encounter she had with the Tracys was with the fourth of them, because he’d come home at four in the morning, and the lock on her front door had been broken.

She’d woken to the sound of someone stumbling through her front room, and her hand had fumbled by her bedside for the baseball bat, leaning against the filing cabinet she’d found by the curb, pulling double duty as a dresser, and tripe duty as a bedside table.

There’d been a tremendous crash of someone tripping over her coffee table—well, rather, her piece of plywood and lopsided collection of cinderblocks—and she’d suddenly been infuriated by the sheer  _nerve_  of anyone who’d try to break in and rob her of what little she had.

So she’d climbed off her sagging futon, hoisted her baseball bat, and kicked open her bedroom door.

It’d been the uniform that had spared him immediately having his head bashed in, the uniform that had given her pause.

Certainly it had been nothing to do with the way he’d been startlingly handsome, all blond and bewildered and sprawled out on the cracked linoleum, when she’d managed to fumble the light switch on and demand to know what the hell he was doing.

It had turned out to be a perfectly understandable mix-up. One floor off. Broken lock. Four in the morning, and him just coming off a double shift. He’d even been decent enough not to mention the fact that she was only in her underwear and a t-shirt and had accepted a hand up to his feet, sheepish and shy.

The next morning there’d been a knock on her door, and brother number three had turned up, toolbox and a brand new lock in hand, and with a few choice comments to make about the landlord. She’d made him tea (lacking much else, Penelope at least always has tea) and they’d chatted politely, and she’d met her first neighbour. He’d introduced himself as Virgil and mentioned that his younger brother was Gordon, and she’d told him her name was Penny.

By the time he’d gotten done, her door had a new lock, her leaking sink had been tightened up, and the spider that lived in her bathtub had been relocated. And Penelope had finally made friends with her neighbours, all five of them, plus their grandmother.

And sometimes Penelope will catch a ride to work with John, or sometimes there’s a lightbulb that needs changing and she’s too short to change it herself, so Scott will stick his head in. And sometimes she’ll order a pizza and split it with whoever happens to be home when she does. Sometimes she’ll just come and sit with their grandmother, missing the company of another woman, in this big strange city where she’s so obviously out of place.

It’s brother number two who’s knocking on her door this time, though at an hour of the evening when it’s usually Gordon she’s expecting. Gordon gets home late. And Gordon doesn’t knock. Gordon has her spare key. Gordon talks in his sleep and half the time he’s too tired for any of the reasons she likes to have him over in the first place, but Penelope’s beginning to wonder if it’s not just falling asleep beside him that she might like best.

But it’s not Gordon, because Gordon’s working. So it’s John.

And when she opens the door, his eyes are bright and his hands are shaking and Penny’s not sure if she’s ever seen him so badly scared.

So of course she says yes when he asks if she could possibly come and sit with his grandmother. It’s just the neighbourly thing to do.

* * *

Originally, Kayo had joined the force to make a name for herself. Or, more accurately, to redefine what her name meant. She needed to show everyone, herself included, that she was nothing like her uncle and never would be. And she’d needed a way to shut up the cruel little voice in the back of her head that sounded exactly like her uncle, mocking her every move.

Despite that, she loved it. And she’d been pleasantly surprised by her partner. Sure, she’d had to prove herself, but Scott Tracy was a good man. He treated her with respect and unlike so many people in her life, never talked down to her or treated her like she was lesser than him. He was a little reckless sometimes, a little distracted others, but he was a good teacher and a great partner, and Kayo was appreciative.

He was also extraordinarily easy to read. Which was why, when she came back to let him know what she’d found, she immediately knew something was wrong.

He was wide-eyed and pale, staring at the back of the ambulance she knew his little brother drove. Kayo had a bad feeling about this.

“Scott?” she said, ignoring formalities. If he had a problem with it, he’d let her know.

“Huh?” Scott said, not looking at her. He only barely seemed to register her presence.

Kayo glanced at the car he was still standing next to, then at the ambulance. “What happened?”

Something had to have happened. Because she’d seen Scott handle horrible scenes before, and nothing had ever shaken him like this. There had been times when he was exhausted and they came up on a crash or a fight and he’d been a little quiet and tense, but never this bad. Not once.

“What?"Scott said, and he finally looked at her. And when he met her eyes, Kayo could see the truth.

Scott Tracy was scared.

"What happened?"she asked, aware that he was superior and that the tone she was using was possibly inappropriate to be directing at him. But he wasn’t acting like her superior and Kayo didn’t know what to do.

Scott turned his gaze back to the ambulance, its lights flashing. It started to pull away, the sirens turning on, and somehow he seemed to pale even more.

"My little brother,” he said. “Alan.”

The youngest, she reminded herself. Sixteen, rebellious, reckless. The one time she’d met him, he’d seemed distant.

Scott insisted he was a good kid. Kayo was pretty sure he was biased.

Then she realized what he was saying. She felt her stomach drop.

“He was here?”

Scott nodded, still watching the ambulance. “He was…he looked pretty bad.”

Kayo didn’t know what to say. The usual things they said to families wouldn’t work here, not when Scott knew exactly what she wasn’t saying. They didn’t know how it would turn out, they would do their best, they wouldn’t make promises because some things were out of their control. Scott knew all that. And Kayo didn’t have any family to compare the way he was feeling to.

So she did what she always did, and barreled on ahead.

“I found something,” she said.

Scott tore his eyes away from the ambulance, as lights and sirens came on, the vehicle pulled away from the scene and out of their sight. “And?”

“You’re not gonna like it.”


	3. Chapter 3

John was, to most of the emergency services, a voice on the other end of the line, ordering, organizing, chasing and, very rarely, yelling at them to get where they needed to go. John’s voice was the thread that linked the emergency teams to the victims, brought them together for hopefully happy endings.

His face meant nothing. But the second he opened his mouth, every uniform in the place spun around to listen.

John wanted to scream; his heart was in his throat. But as soon as he barreled into the charge desk, his training took over, and he spoke his request quickly, firmly, in a tone that brooked no argument and ruffled no feathers.

He was aware of the stares as he was whisked up to emergency. A whispered conversation between two orderlies, and a Authorized Staff Only door was being opened for him. John strode down the corridor, his new escort struggling to keep up, as John homed in on the sound of heart monitors and sharply snapped commands.

Scott looked out of place here, the wrong coloured blues, his bulky jacket the wrong shape amid the light, sleek scrubs of the surgical staff. John diverted over, his escort melting away. “Scott?”

Scott’s head snapped around, his eyes wide and red-rimmed, his breathing shallow and shaky. John took him by the shoulders, gently turning him so they stood fully face to face. “Talk to me,” John said, his voice dropping automatically into a work register.

“They took him into the operating room. Gordon…they’re letting Gordon observe, so he’s not alone. He said it shouldn’t be long, that I should wait..”

He trailed off, and John tried a different tack. “What happened?”

“Street racing. A car crash.” Even as he watched, John saw Scott flicker between being a cop and being a brother. “Those were some souped up cars, Johnny. Seriously expensive, not the usual rust buckets those kids race. Kayo thinks so. I’ve sent her to make sure. We need evidence.”

“Evidence for what?”

Scott’s eyes darkened. “They hurt Alan, John. Whoever they are, they put him in that car and now he’s in surgery. They hurt him, and when I find them, I’m going to throw the book at them so hard they’re never getting back up.” Scott blinked, looking over John’s shoulder. “Where’s Grandma? And Virgil?”

John felt his lips thin. “I asked Penny from downstairs to sit in with Grandma. I…I didn’t want her to worry, and she can’t spend a night in the waiting room, not with how she’s feeling right now.” John took a deep, steadying breath. “And Virgil went out to look for Alan, and now I can’t reach him on his phone.”

Scott’s expression crumpled. “Well— _shit_.”

* * *

Virgil peered out the window. “You’re sure this is where he gets off?”

The bus driver snorted. “Hard to forget. He usually walks off that way.”

He pointed up the street, down towards a row of dark, sketchy-looking buildings. Virgil could hear Scott’s voice in his head telling him stories of stupid kids wandering places they shouldn’t and ending up hurt or worse. He hoped he wasn’t about to become one of those stories.

He hoped Alan hadn’t become one tonight.

“You want me to wait?” the bus driver asked as Virgil stepped off.

Part of Virgil wanted to say yes, but he shook his head. “I’ll be fine. Thanks.”

The driver didn’t seem convinced, but he nodded. “Be careful, kid.”

“Will do,” Virgil said, and headed up the street.

If he’d thought it looked bad from the bus, it looked even worse up close. Most of the buildings were clearly abandoned, covered in graffiti and God only knew what else. A few had lights on, but Virgil avoided them, hoping that his kid brother wasn’t stupid enough to wander into places like that. Another had a man standing out front as if acting like a bouncer and he looked seriously pissed. Virgil carefully stayed on the other side of the street.

At the end of that block, there was a garage, and one of the doors was open. The lights were on inside, and soft classical music played inside. Virgil took a deep breath and prayed that he wasn’t about to walk into a cover for a mafia or crime ring before sticking his head in. “Hello?”

There was a clang like someone dropped metal on the ground and a strangled shout. Virgil stepped into the garage cautiously, looking around. He took another step and then jumped backwards as a head appeared from behind the car closest to him.

“Jesus,” he breathed. For a second, they just stared at each other; the other man was clearly as surprised as Virgil was, dressed in a canvas coverall stained with oil and grease. His hands, in spite of this, were remarkably clean.

Finally, the man spoke. “Can I h-help you?”

“Uh,” Virgil had to think for a moment to remember why he was there. “Maybe. I’m looking for my brother.”

The man studied him for a moment. “Hopefully you d-d-don’t find him here.”

Virgil blinked at him, caught off-guard. “What do you mean by that?”

“You should p-probably go,” the man said. “This isn’t the k-k-kind of place you want to be seen.”

“Wait,” Virgil said, still confused. “Listen, my little brother heads out this way sometimes, this is him,” he pulled out his phone to pull up the picture, only to see a black screen. Shit, he should have charged it. “Uh, never mind. He’s about this tall, blond, answers to Alan?”

“Alan?” the man said, straightening up. “Why are you l-looking for Alan?”

“I just  _told_  you, he’s my little brother,” Virgil said, trying to reign in his frustration. “Is he here?” He looked around, somewhat hoping to see Alan pop up from behind one of the other cars.

As empty as the garage was, this seemed as stupid a question as “Why are you looking for Alan?” and the man in the coverall gave him an appropriately bewildered look. “N-no, he’s at the  _race_ ,” he said, as though explaining something obvious.

“Race?” Virgil asked. “What race?”

“You don’t know?” the man looked surprised. “I t-t-thought…this explains a lot.”

“What does that mean?” Virgil demanded.

“He’s one of my b-b-boss’ drivers,” the man said. “He’s racing right n-now.”

Virgil stared at him. Things were starting to click in his mind. “Alan’s been racing?”

“Y-yes,” the man said. He held out his hand, which Virgil shook automatically. “I’m Brains.”

“Virgil.”

“The races u-usually end around eleven,” Brains said. “I’ll l-l-let Alan know you were here.”

“Wait, I’m not leaving,” Virgil said. “He’s been  _street racing_? Scott’s going to kill him.  _I’m_  going to kill him.”

“Y-y-you can’t stay here,” Brains said, suddenly looking anxious. “If my b-boss sees you here a-a-and hears you’re asking questions, it’ll c-cause trouble.”

“I’m not leaving without Alan,” Virgil said stubbornly. Street racing. He’d known Alan had been up to something, but he hadn’t expected it to be so stupid and dangerous. And illegal. He couldn’t believe this.

“You d-don’t understand,” Brains said, moving around the car to stand in front of Virgil. “He’s n-n-not someone you want to make angry. P-please, I’ll let Alan know you were here, but -.”

“If you let him know I was here, he’ll run for it,” Virgil said. “No, it’s better if I wait.”

Brains opened his mouth, clearly ready to argue, but one of the garage doors on the side of the building started opening. Brains whirled around, then turned back to Virgil. Then he grabbed Virgil’s arm and pulled him to the workspace near them, pushing him in the direction of the desk.

“Hide,” he whispered. “D-d-don’t let him know you’re here.”

Virgil, feeling utterly ridiculous, did as told, folding himself under the desk. He could hear a car engine revving as it entered the garage, and wondered idly what kind of engine purred in that way. He almost wanted to peek out to see it.

“You’re b-b-back early,” Brains said after the car engine shut off.

“Race was a bust,” another, deeper voice said. “Lemaire’s kid lost traction, took out half the cars, including ours. Tracy probably got picked up, if he’s even in one piece.”

Virgil’s blood ran cold.  _Alan_.

* * *

Brains tried through willpower alone not to look where he’d stashed Alan’s brother. The Boss in his best mood wasn’t the kind of man to tolerate interlopers.

Now? Brains shuddered to think what he might do.

There was a lot of money on that race, and Brains had wanted for nothing as he had souped up each of the cars. The vehicles were an investment in The Mechanic’s business, and if Brandon had not only crashed but wiped out, then that was a lot of money gone.

It wasn’t as if there was insurance for underground street races.

An angry snapping of fingers brought Brains back to the present. “I need you to pack up shop,” came the snapped order that Brains was expecting. “There were cops all over the scene, we can’t have them snooping around, not now.”

Brains nodded frantically, not trusting his voice.

At least his being speechless and panicky was normal behaviour around the Boss. With a disgusted noise, he stormed off and left Brains alone.

Brains waited until he heard the far doors bang, the roar of a motor. Only then did he relax. “Y-you can c-come out now,” he murmured, taking off his glasses to rub his tired eyes.

Alan’s brother was bigger, and taller, and utterly furious, the kind of anger Brains recognized as being driven by fear. The worst kind. “Talk,” he ordered.

Brains moved to his computers, tucking his glasses back onto his nose. The system shutdown took a while, it was the first step in his teardown pattern. “You p-probably know as much as I d-do now,” Brains said tiredly. The computer beeped, a countdown appearing on screen as Brains activated the appropriate subroutine. “L-listen, I p-put in every safety device I can sneak p-pass the B-Boss,” he stammered, his anxiety already growing. He should know better by now not to get too close to the drivers. Crash or arrest, or just burned by the Mechanic, they never stuck around for long. “G-g-go find your brother. I h-hope he’s okay, really I d-do.”

Virgil stared at him for a long time. “Are  _you_  going to be okay?”

Brains blinked, stunned.

No-one had ever asked him that before.


	4. Chapter 4

Gordon entered the bathroom and locked the door behind him before leaning back against the wall. He pressed the heel of his hands against his eyes and took a deep breath. Then another, forcing himself to keep them even and slow.

Now wasn’t the time for this.

God, but he was tired.

No doubt Scott was in the waiting room, wearing a hole in the floor from his pacing. John and Virgil were probably there, or maybe one of them had stayed home with Grandma. The waiting room wasn’t the ideal pace for her to be resting, especially with how bad the pain had been recently.

He wanted nothing more to just sink down to the floor, but he knew he had to let his brothers know how it had gone. How  _incredibly_  lucky their dumbass little brother was. He pushed himself off the wall and turned on the sink, splashing his face with cold water. Then he dried his face and left the bathroom before he gave into the urge to yell.

Scott and John weren’t hard to find; Scott was still in uniform, and the two of them were both so stupidly tall it would have been impossible for Gordon to miss them. He didn’t see Virgil anywhere.

Scott spotted him first and immediately headed towards him, pulling John after him. Scott looked like he’d aged twenty years since the last time Gordon had seen him. John’s face was carefully neutral, but the tightness around his eyes told Gordon that he, too, was reaching his breaking point.

“How is he?"Scott asked before he’d even fully reached Gordon.

"He’s out of surgery,” Gordon said. He held his hands up to stop them from speaking. “There were clear signs of internal bleeding, they needed to open him up to stop it. He has a few broken ribs and there’s been some associated damage to his liver. They’re going to keep an eye on it, but for the moment it’s under control.”

“And?"John prompted.

"From what it looks like, he hit the door pretty hard and dislocated his left shoulder,” Gordon said. “He’s got a pretty nasty bruise from his seatbelt, he probably has whiplash. They were talking about taking x-rays of his collar bone. He has a concussion, but…it could have been a  _lot_  worse. He had a helmet on. The visor broke and left a nasty cut above his eye, but the helmet probably saved his life.”

 _Definitely_  saved his life. From the looks on their faces, Scott and John knew that as well as Gordon did. He quickly added, “He woke up on the way here. He was disoriented, but he was responsive and he recognized me. I don’t think he remembered what happened.”

“I’d rather he didn’t remember,” Scott said. His expression darkened. “After I get out of him who put him in that car.”

“Did your rookie find anything?” Gordon asked.

“She’s still looking,” Scott said, running a hand through his hair. “Can we see Alan?”

“Not yet,” Gordon said. “They have to do a CT scan, and more x-rays. It’ll be soon, I think. Grandma and Virgil at home?”

Scott and John glanced at each other, and Gordon felt his stomach sink. “What?”

“Grandma’s with Penny,” John said. Gordon narrowed his eyes.

“Where’s Virgil?"he asked.

"We don’t know,” John admitted. “He was out looking for Alan. He’s not answering his phone.”

“Oh,” Gordon said, keeping his voice steady through sheer force of will. He really wanted to yell. Virgil didn’t usually disappear like this. Virgil always answered the phone. Always. He was somewhat neurotic about it. Something was wrong.

All three of them jumped as Scott’s phone started ringing. Scott snatched it up, looking at the caller ID before he sighed.

“Kayo.”

Gordon tried not to feel disappointed as Scott answered the call. He stepped away from them.

“You should sit down,” John said, and it took Gordon a second to realize he was talking to him.

“Huh?”

“You look like you’re about to fall over,” John said. “You should sit down.”

“I’m still on call,” Gordon said.

“No, you’re not,” John said. “You’re officially off the clock as of an hour ago. I called. One of the guys dropped your stuff off about twenty minutes ago. Here,” he pushed Gordon’s phone into his hand. “Someone needs to call Penny and Grandma and tell them what happened.”

“Wait, they don’t  _know_?” Gordon said, his eyes widening.

“Gordon,  _I_  didn’t even know what had actually happened until I got here,” John said. “All Scott told me over the phone was, ‘Alan’s hurt bad, come to the hospital’. ”

Gordon grimaced. “Ah. Grandma’s going to kill you, you do realize that, right?”

“Yeah. I know.”

* * *

Her phone sits on top of the quilt, spread over Ruth Tracy’s lap, and Penny’s just lost her third hand of canasta. John had said, before he’d left, that he’d given his grandmother a pill for the pain she was in, but whatever it was seems only to have sharpened the woman’s card sense, because Penelope’s been beaten  _soundly_  each time.

She wonders, as she peers at her cards, if Gordon’s brothers ask the obvious question of just where the pain meds  _come_  from. They must know better than to ask. Or they must not want to know. Scott would have to look so far the other way he’d probably just about snap his neck.

Penny had rumbled him the first time he’d come over to spend the night. They’d been out a few times before that, the sort of airy, unserious sorts of dates that could be afforded by a waitress and a paramedic. A movie, though what they could agree upon was nothing either of them were especially interested in. Coffee, once, though it had been in the same coffeeshop where Penny spends her workday, and so there’d been the awkward reality of all her co-workers grinning at her the whole way through. A picnic in the park, a walk along the river, and the sort of conversation that had been the clincher, because neither of them had talked around their problems. There’d been an intensity to the honest exchange of circumstances that had only served to pull them that much closer.

It had been after that particular conversation that she’d suggested that maybe the last flight of stairs up to his place might not be worth the trouble, and that maybe he ought to come in. There’d been a certain absence of ambiguity about her motives, and she was hardly too proud to admit that this was more or less what she’d been after in the first place. He’d gone to shower and she’d gone to sit on the bed in her room, where he’d left his bag.

And, well. If he hadn’t wanted to get caught at it, then he probably shouldn’t have left a full bottle of painkillers sitting so near to the top of his duffel bag. She’d only been curious to find out if he habitually carried condoms, or whether there was going to be a mad and embarrassing dash to the drug store down the street.

If he hadn’t caught her, catching him, she wonders sometimes if she would have left it alone. If she would have been desperate and lonely enough to look the other way, to draw the wrong conclusion entirely about Gordon Tracy, and the reasons he managed to stay so cheerful and buoyant and sunshiney, despite his job and despite his circumstances. Instead she’d looked up at the sound of an awkward cough from her bedroom doorway, with a pill bottle clasped in her hand and an expression of surprise.

And if he hadn’t been naked but for the towel around his waist and grinning at her sheepishly, Penny might have been afraid to have been caught by him.

But instead he’d just crossed the room and sat down on the bed, and had reached over to take the little bottle out of her hand and stash it back in his bag. “You don’t have to believe me,” he’d told her, and she’d done her damnedest to meet his eyes instead of being distracted by the curve of his torso, the way his towel sat just below his hips— “I’ve got about a million problems, Pen, and if the fact that I’m the worst kinda drug-stealing, cowardly, hypocritical bastard is one of 'em, then at least being a drug addict  _isn’t_. I’m dumb, but I’m not  _that_  dumb.”

“For your grandmother?” she’d asked softly. She’d swallowed and hoped that she knew what the answer would be.

He’d nodded and sighed. “Yeah. Umm. John, once in a while, he gets the most wicked migraines, poor bastard. If, uh. If we get to be a thing—and I’m not saying…I’m not saying we  _are_ …unless you wanna be, but you know, that’s just whatever, because that’s a whole other thing—anyway. You should come meet her sometime. Either way, even if we don’t keep doing…uh. This. You should still meet my grandma. She’s a hell of a lady. You’d like each other.”

It was what he’d said next, and the way he’d said it, more than anything, that had made her believe him.  _I’ve never known anybody, more than my gran, who deserved just a little less pain._

And he’d been right. Even if she hadn’t gone on to lean over and kiss him and run her hands through his still damp hair—when she’d gone on to meet Ruth Tracy, she’d seen the sort of beautiful, strong old soul that could raise five boys into the kind of adults her grandsons were, and still have a smile and a gleam in her eye from the confines of her sickbed.

So now Penelope sat on the end of Ruth’s bed, with cards spread out between them, and her phone on the bedspread. When it rings, before she can reach for it, a surprisingly quick hand reached out and caught her wrist. “My dear,” Ruth started, and her eyes were sharp and bright when Penny looked up to meet them, “I’m always happy to see you. And I’m glad that you’re here now. But if that’s one of my boys, you’re going to make them tell me just what the hell is going on, or by god, Penelope, I’ll stump out of here myself and get on a bus.”

She looks down at her phone, but the custom ringtone’s already given him away, because the bright and cheerful tones of  _Walking on Sunshine_  have filled the room. This is probably a question best put to Gordon, anyway, though in her heart she dreads the answer. “…Yes, ma'am.”

* * *

Technically, Kayo’s shift ended an hour ago, so the fact that she was in plain clothes wasn’t, technically, against regs. And Tracy had told her to follow her nose, and he was her TO, so technically this was an authorized operation.

 _Technically_. Kayo was comfortable with technically.

Out of uniform, in skinny jeans and an old band shirt she’d found at the back of her closet, her leather jacket over the top covering her service weapon tucked away in its holster, she could still just pass as one of them. She knew the language of the street, even if these weren’t the streets she learned it on. Regardless of the city, the basics were the same.

Kayo smiled at the kid they called Shifty as she passed, letting him get a good look at her. There was always a kid called Shifty, and he always knew the score. She knew from the gossip in the breakroom that this town’s Shifty hung out by the gas station on Third, at the point where strip mall shops turned into small workshops and storehouses, the street running down to where the bigger warehouses were located.

Shifty was taller than her, but the kind of skinny you only got when meals were few and far between. Kayo went into the gas station, came out a moment later with a fist-full of brightly coloured packages, jerky and twinkies, the kind of things that kept, and could be crammed in a hoodie pocket. “Hey, Shifty,” she called out, tossing over one of the packages as her price of entry into this conversation. “What’s the deal with that crash tonight?”

A brief conversation and the rest of her snacks later, and Kayo was walking confidently down towards the warehouses. Half the street lights in this area were out, knocked out or just never replaced, and Kayo hooked her hands in her belt loops, flexed and ready to reach for her gun.

The word on the street was fear. Shifty had counseled she lie low, that 'The Boss,’ whoever that was, was on the warpath, pissed that the big race had quite literally gone sideways into a ditch.

That there was a Boss calling the shots worried her. This wasn’t just a bunch of kids in hot cars, blowing off steam and hormones late at night, dangerous but innocent.

This was organized. That meant there was an organizer, and a reason.

Kayo slowed, ears pricking. She could just make out the faintest susurrations of voices, the tone implying a debate was in full flow. There was light, just visible under the transom of the human sized door set into the larger, hangar-style sliders.

Every other warehouse was dark, felt empty. Kayo circled her target, looking for another way in. She found it out the back, a broken window badly covered with a sheet of pressboard. A moment’s work, and she was climbing inside.

Inside was a large workshop, mostly empty but for a few cars up on roller racks so that mechanics could get at the underbelly. The arrangement of the room suggested to her that this space normally was crammed with vehicles.

This was where the race started.

Kayo flicked open her jacket, ready to draw, as she crept closer to the light pooling out onto the concrete from a little shack made of flimsy plywood and pressboard, built against the far wall.

The voices were clearer here, and Kayo listened, getting a bead on the argument.

One voice was trying to persuade the other…to do what, she wasn’t sure. The debate had descended into pleas and bargaining. She crept up to the window that looked out over the workshop and peered inside. Half-turned towards her, a small skinny figure in glasses was glancing between monitors propped up on a makeshift desk.

The figure with his back to her was bigger, taller, stronger. Kayo’s lips pursed, judging her odds of taking him in a fight. In a confined space, a gun was more a liability than a threat, but big guys fell hard if you had the leverage.

And there was a tyre iron, propped up on the wall beside her.

Kayo smiled in the dark, tucked her badge into the waist of her jeans so her shield showed, hefted her weapon and stepped into makeshift office.

“ _Police_! Hands in the… _Virgil_?”

Virgil already had his hands half-up, an automatic reaction. Even so, the other figure was faster, hands almost stretching for the sky. “Kayo?” Virgil asked, blinking hard.

She lowered her weapon. “What on earth are you doing here?”

Virgil shrugged. “Same as you, I suspect.” He turned back towards the other figure, still with his hands in the air, his eyes darting between them behind his thick-rimmed glasses. “Officer Kyrano, let me introduce you to Brains.” Virgil sighed, sounding tired. “I think he knows what’s going on.”

Technically, she didn’t have enough evidence for probable cause, not enough of the pieces to make an arrest. But, she wondered, did Brains know that. She tapped her nails against her badge, an idle, casual gesture that caught and held his attention. “I think it would be in Mr Brains’ best interests if he started talking.” She let the tyre iron drag on the concrete floor as she took a step forward, saw Brains’ eyes widen.

Technically, this type of interrogation wasn’t illegal.

Technically.

* * *

 

Things like this happen to other people all day, every day.

It’s just statistical, there’s almost a theory to the chaos of it all. Some days nothing feels right until he’s had a certain number of a certain kind of call. Five car crashes sometimes won’t seem like enough. Sometimes he feels like he can just tell, before a call even connects, that it’s going to be a heart attack, because he just hasn’t had one in a while. He tallies these things up like they don’t represent the worst days of other people’s lives. To do his job well, it’s necessary to be detached, to be calm and practical and fixated on the facts of a situation, not the emotions of the people involved. Maybe that’s why John feels so numb, here and now, standing at the window with his back to his little brother.

Scott’s gone, though he’d sworn to be back as soon as possible. He’s had to go report in to his superiors, and to get permission to take some emergency leave. There’s no question that this will be granted, but it still needs to be made formal, and he has a report to make about the scene he’d responded to. Gordon’s gone home, and that’d been for the best, because their grandmother will need his attention. He’s not only the best at taking care of her, but the best at getting her to admit she needs to be taken care of. Virgil, as far as John’s aware, is still MIA.

And now that he’s finally been allowed into Alan’s hospital room, he can’t actually bring himself to sit down in the chair that’s been pulled up beside the bed. He’s barely been able to look at his little brother, because this is all wrong. He can’t sit at his brother’s bedside, because it will be too much like sitting at his mother’s bedside, and that was never supposed to happen again. Their mother had gotten sick, and her medical bills had drained every cent from the family, and she’d died anyway, only to leave them in debt they’re still paying off. Their father had slowly gone just about out of his mind with grief, and then one day he’d just disappeared. Left the five of them and their grandmother to manage without him, and to this day, even having been no small part of how they’d gotten through it, John still doesn’t know how exactly they’d managed.

But this isn’t like that. This is injury, not illness. And this is Alan, not Mom. This is sudden and sharp and shocking, as opposed to their mother’s long, slow decline. And this time around they  _have_ insurance, Scott is Alan’s legal guardian, and Scott’s got a decent health plan, such as it is.

And Alan’s  _not_  going to die. Probably. Gordon had been very careful to be clear about how lucky their little brother had been, but there’s no way around the reality that this is bad. Alan’s young and healthy and if he’s a little scrawny, that’s still probably about the only thing he’s got working against him, so his odds are good. He’ll get better.

But it’s a lot. It’s more than John can even think about right now, because right now all he can do is stand at the window of his little brother’s hospital room, watching the orange glow of the parking lot lights through the raindrops that glint on the glass. There’s no rhyme or reason or pattern to them, but he’s still trying to find one. There’s got to be more sense in rain on the window than there is in what’s happening to his family. To his baby brother. In spite of everything, in spite of what he does and the way that he acts, Alan doesn’t deserve this.

 _Alan’s a good kid_.

It’s Scott’s mantra. And John gets it, and deep down he knows it’s true, because even in spite of everything, he  _knows_  Alan. There are still occasional flashes of the kid he used to be—smart and kind and clever and funny—but the goodness in his nature has been lacquered over by anger, layer upon layer building up over his surface, as he’d tried to make himself harder than the world he has to face.

John loves his brothers, his grandmother. Some deeply buried part of him may even still love his father, though if ever he sees Jeff Tracy’s face again, John’s pretty sure he wouldn’t be able to help but throw a fist at it. But Alan—

Lately he’s been hard pressed to remember the last time he even  _liked_  Alan. He hates himself for thinking it, but even here and now, John almost can’t help believing that at least something like this might teach his little brother a lesson.

John had been Alan’s age when their mother had died, over a decade ago now, and John’s about that same decade Alan’s senior. An entire ten years between them, and yet John still remembers the lost, lonely little boy who’d been so scared and so desperate after that one, horrible, final day. Their mother had died in a hospital much like this one. And from then on, Alan had been adrift, young and tiny and terrified, and in the maelstrom of grief that had swallowed their whole family, somehow he’d managed to find his way to John and latch on for dear life.

Sixteen to his brother’s six, John had suddenly become a surrogate for everything their mother had been to Alan, a source of comfort and care and attention and affection, things he’d never particularly sought from his brothers, and certainly never from their father. Most of all, he’d just needed the reassurance that he was still loved, and that he’d always be cared for.

Maybe that assurance is something that they’ve allowed to let slip. Maybe they should’ve tried harder. Maybe this never would’ve happened if they’d just managed to find some time, some energy, some way to get through to Alan. Between the four—the five of them, counting Grandma—they should’ve been able to make it work. It shouldn’t have had to come to this, to a lesson learned in a hospital room.

Better late than never, John manages to tear himself away from the senselessness of raindrops on the windowpane, and towards his little brother, still senseless in a hospital bed. The first step he takes towards the chair at the bedside actually makes his head spin, a little, and he gets the reminder that he’s been awake for what’ll be twenty four hours, come four AM. He muscles past the vertigo and drops himself into the chair at the bedside. He still can’t quite look at his little brother—all those tubes and lines and bandages and bruises make him too much of a stranger—but he can reach for Alan’s hand, can carefully stroke his fingertips across his upturned palm.

“I’m sorry, Al,” he says, softly and mostly to himself, because it won’t excuse the last thing he’d said to Alan. “I’m sorry, I should’ve done more.”


	5. Chapter 5

Virgil hung back, became part of the furniture as Kayo became the totality of Brain’s world.

Scott rarely spoke of his new partner, but when he did, it was with the kind of quiet pride he used to use for Alan. When Alan had started disappearing, apparently to places like this, that tone had vanished until Officer Kyrano had tumbled out of the training academy and into Scott’s cruiser.

This is the first time he’s seen her work; he gets Scott’s pride now.  Her interrogation implies hot lamps and pressure, for all that she’s perched herself on the desk next to where Brains is sat, her body language open and friendly and interested in anything he might have to say.

Brains is street-wise enough to know he’s being questioned.  He fidgets in his seat, so clearly torn between keeping the code of silence and telling them everything that even Virgil can see it.

Virgil stays out of Brains line of sight, lets her work as he drifts around the warehouse, looking for clues with an amateur eye.  In his head, that dark voice dispassionately saying the words  “Tracy probably got picked up, if he’s even in one piece” kept rattling around his brain.

Virgil’s been to enough wrecks to know how easily a ton of steel moving at speed can tie itself into a knot around a lamp post. But the voice hadn’t sounded too worried, except for the possibility that Alan was now in police custody.

This was an illegal chop shop; no doubt Scott was right now breaking out the actual hot lamps to find out what the  _hell_  Alan was doing down here.  In his pocket, his dead cellphone was an accusatory dead weight.

Alan had to be all right.  Brains said he put in every safety feature, and there was a rack of helmets over by the far wall.

Alan had to be all right.

“Wait, The Mechanic?” Kayo’s surprise is loud in the quiet, yanking Virgil’s attention back into the moment.  He drifts closer, slowing at Kayo’s almost imperceptible head shake.  “You work for the Mechanic?”

Brains is hunching down in his coveralls like a grease-marked turtle.  “I h-h-have to,” he mutters as he shoves his glasses back up the bridge of his nose. 

Kayo’s voice is  leonine purr.  “Brains, I can only help you if you help me?”  She smiles, letting the hook catch and settle before she applies the stick.  “Or I can slap on the hand cuffs and have the entire forensic unit down here sweeping for whatever they can find.”

Brains sucks in a noisy breath through his nose, straightening his spine. “I c-can’t!” he almost spits at her.  “I h-h-have a debt to pay.  Everyone here does. Me.” He glances over his shoulder at Virgil.  “His brother. Everyone.”

“What do you mean? Alan?” Virgil can’t stop himself. He knows he’s a big guy, tries always not to loom, but Brains has the answers that he needs.  Brains flinches back, the desk chair squeaking as it rocks with his weight as Virgil plants his fists heavily on the scarred wooden desktop.  “What debt? Who is the Mechanic? What the  _hell_  is going on?”

In the pregnant silence that follows, the buzz of Kayo’s cellphone is loud. She sighs, sounding frustrated as she slips off the desk, thumbing the call connection as she stalks across the workshop floor.  “Yeah. Hey, yeah.  Found your other brothers…uh huh. That’s great news.  Scott, I’ve found something.  Yeah.  It’s the Mechanic.”  Kayo turns, listening intently as she stares at Brains.  “I have a witness. Potentially cooperative, if he knows what’s good for him. Uh huh.  Yeah, I’ll be there in twenty.”  She drops her phone into her pocket, her boots like gunshots as she strides across the floor.

Virgil fumbles the car keys she tosses at his chest.  “You’re driving.  Me and my new friend here,” she continues, grabbing Brains by the collar.  “Are going to be having a little chat on the drive over.”

Brains seems resigned to his fate as Kayo shoves him behind the metal grating of the unmarked precinct car.  “Station?” Virgil asks, adjusting the mirrors.

The look Kayo gives him goes on for far too long.  “Scott’s meeting us at the hospital.” Her hand is warm where she wraps it over his wrist.  “Alan’s going to be fine,” she begins gently.  “But it was close. Real close.”

Virgil’s knuckles go white over the steering wheel.

“Virgil? I’m sorry, I thought you knew. Are you okay? Maybe I should drive…”

“No.” He snaps the word with more force than she deserves.  He glances up, catches Brains’ eye in the mirror.  “You have until we get there to tell her everything. Or I’ll do the asking, and I’ve not sworn any oath to protect and serve.”  He waits until Brains, swallowing hard, bobs his head up and down.  “Good.”

The tires squeal as Virgil peels out of the gravel lot and tears off down the empty streets.

* * *

 

Scott’s waiting in the parking lot when Kayo’s car turns into the lot. He’s been standing in the shadows, well away from the door, smoking his way through a pack of cigarettes that none of his brothers know he has. Kayo does. She also seems to know he’ll be waiting for her, because she doesn’t seek out one of the spots nearest the main entry way, but parks deliberately at a distance. Scott’s flicked away a half-smoked cigarette and is already on the move as the car’s headlights dim down and the engine rumbles into silence, though the doors don’t open and no one exits the vehicle.

Scott’s still in uniform, but only because hasn’t found a moment to change. He’d been back to the precinct, met with his Captain and explained the situation. He’s got two weeks of leave, and Captain Casey had expressed her personal sympathy, her hope that his brother would recover quickly. She hadn’t let him try to expand on the details of the case, because it’s no longer something he can be involved in.

Not officially, anyway.

But Kayo’s parked her car beneath a street lamp in the far corner of the hospital parking lot, and as Scott approaches, the driver’s side door opens, and it becomes apparent that it’s not Kayo who’s parked the car, but Virgil. After a night like this one, it’s a relief to finally have the all of his brothers properly accounted for, and before Scott can say anything, Virgil holds out an arm to catch his shoulder, and then pulls him into a brief, wordless hug. A hand thumps on his back once, solidly, and then breaks apart again, like it hasn’t even happened.

It’s still the most comforting gesture anyone’s made since Gordon came up to him and said “It’s Alan.”

So Scott does his best to return the favour, and answers the question his brother hasn’t yet asked. “He’s been moved to a room. John’s with him, I sent Gordon home to crash, he’s coming off a double shift and someone needs to be with Grandma. We’re gonna need to work out some kinda schedule, I don’t want Al alone. Probably gonna be mostly you and me, but that’s gonna mean dragging John out of there. He’s taking this pretty hard.”

“It’s not his fault.”

Scott sighs and shakes his head. “No. But John was the last one to see Allie, before he left tonight. Thinks he could’ve stopped him. Thinks he should’ve seen this coming.”

Virgil’s wearing an old bomber jacket of their father’s, more because it’s sturdy and warm and it fits him than for anything like sentimentality. It makes the fall of his shoulders that much more evident, as he looks down and the toes of his boots scuff against the ground. “Yeah. Well, that makes two of this. I  _knew_  he was up to something. I was figuring it out. I wanted to know what it was before I let anyone else in on it—for all I knew the kid was volunteering at a soup kitchen or something—but I should’ve done it sooner. I pull all that overtime, I’m never  _around_ …if I’d—”

“Stop,” Scott cuts him off. “Doesn’t do any good. We know what we know now because of you, tonight. Tag outta this one. This part is my problem.”

“What’re you gonna do?”

There’s been nothing but silence from the backseat of Kayo’s Mustang. Scott’s eager to slide into the front seat of his car, to find out more about the man who’s done this to his family. But he doesn’t want his little brother around to see what that looks like. Scott doesn’t actually  _know_  what this is going to look like.

“I’m going to do my job,” he says, instead of admitting that he doesn’t actually know. “You’re going to go inside, room 333. Gordon says that’s a lucky number. Guess it’s easy to remember, anyway. If you can’t get John to go home, try and get him to eat something.”

Virgil doesn’t budge. “Kayo said they’d put you on leave.”

Scott nods. “Yeah, they have. Two weeks.”

“Then this isn’t your job.”

Scott feel his jaw set, lifts his chin slightly as he squares up against his little brother. “My  _responsibilty_ , then. I want to know what happened. And I want to know what I’m gonna be able to do about it,  _before_  there’s a thin blue line between me and the guy who’s done this.”

Virgil winces visibly. “Well, that’s not who’s in the back of this car. Scott, this guy is scared  _shitless_. Your rookie barely put on any pressure at all, and he spilled his guts. I’m not saying good cop/bad cop is the way you and your partner work—but I can tell you, there’s already been plenty of bad cop tonight. If you don’t handle this right—”

“I don’t think you’re in any position to tell me how I’m supposed to handle this.”

“No, I guess I’m not.” But Virgil doesn’t seem quite done, and he hesitates, hunches his shoulders up beneath his heavy leather jacket again. “I think you know better than to need me to, though.”

And with that, Virgil pats a hand twice on the top of the car, and there’s the solid  _thunk_  of the doors unlocking. He steps away from the driver’s side, nods to Scott as he passes. “I’m gonna go check on our brothers. When you get…done…with whatever you plan to do—just…just, let me know if you’ll be free to drive John home. I’m gonna work on getting him out of here.”

“Right. Yeah, okay.”

“Don’t do anything stupid, Scott.”

“Sure, Virg.”

Virgil gives him one last, scrutinizing look, then shakes his head and sighs as he turns away, makes for the hospital’s main entrance. Scott’s not sure if he’s read doubt or disappointment in the tone of his brother’s exit—but it doesn’t really matter. He still doesn’t know what he’s going to do, so Virgil’s advice just melds into the rest of the indecision. Eventaully, without really thinking about it, Scott opens the driver’s side door, and clambers inside.

* * *

For all his life, John’s had a bad habit of gnawing at his nails.

It used to drive their father to distraction, the way John would lose himself in thought and, slowly, his thumb would drift up towards his mouth, his teeth scraping over the nail until their father growled and leaned over to bat John’s hand back down.

Virgil’s been thinking of those moments more and more lately, in the waiting lulls between blazes or when he’s tucked up in bed too tired to sleep.  The exasperated, annoyed noise their father would make whenever one of them did something he didn’t like.

Virgil can’t even imagine the sound Jeff would make, watching John watch Alan sleep, too small in a too big bed.

John starts when Virgil closes the door as loudly as he dares.  John’s hand almost bounces off the armrest as he guiltily yanks it down.  “Oh, man,” he sighs as he relaxes slightly, half rising as Virgil takes the two small steps to Alan’s bedside.  “You are a sight for sore eyes.”

Virgil steadies John, helps him back down.  “How’s he doing?”

John’s already turned back to Alan like he might disappear again if they turn their backs.  “Resting.  First twenty-four hours.  You know the drill.”

They all do.  That’s kind of the problem.  Virgil’s not sure how long Scott’s going to need, and a glance tells him that John’s not going to be levered out of that chair for anything as mundane as food or sleep.

There was a vending machine in the hall; not great, but better than nothing.  He’s not entirely sure John hears him, but Virgil steps back out into the hall without repeating himself anyway.

He just needs a moment to breathe; too much has happened since he last slept.  Alan, and the accident.  Brains, and the Mechanic.  The Mechanic and Alan.  It was all pivoting on Alan, and he was in no state to answer questions.

There were edges Virgil knew he wasn’t seeing yet, but he’d learned long ago to trust his instincts, the one that told him to hit the deck just as the fire seemed under control.  All Virgil’s instincts now were screaming that despite the lull, a blow-up was just about to hit with a ferocity to burn skin from bones.

He’s only got a few coins in the pocket of his jacket, but it’s second nature now to flip the gate, fool the machine to send him both snacks and his change back for another selection.  He catches his reflection in the machine glass, pale and wide-eyed, hair a mess.  The glass is cool as he rests his head against it for a moment, the triple thunk of gate and snacks and coins all dropping felt more than heard.

His brother nearly died tonight, street racing for a shadowy underworld figure, and he’s here getting Cheetos.

“Virgil?” 

Virgil rubs his face as he exhales hard and straightens up.  John’s stood in Alan’s doorway, unwilling to have their youngest out of his sight.  But he’s got his phone to his ear.  “Yeah?  That Scott?”

John nods.  “No,” he says to the voice on the other end of the line.  “I can stay…Virgil is in no state…”

Virgil plucks the phone out of John’s hand.  “Sending him out now.  Tell Gordon to grab my charger when he comes back, would you?”  John’s scowling as he ends the call.  “Here,” he says, shoving the little crinkly packets into John’s hands.  “Go. I’ve got him.”

John tries, but Virgil holds his ground against fire.  John’s close, but he’s not yet quite a force of nature.  Only when Virgil hears the automatic doors at the end of the hall wheeze out and in does Virgil sink into John’s chair and bury his face in his hands.

* * *

It’s so ingrained in him not to waste food that John clutches the packets in his fist as he wanders, almost in a daze, down and out of the hospital.  Only when the cruiser’s lights flash does John see Scott, leaning tiredly against the driver’s side door.

“I’m not that tired, I can..” John begins, slowing as he takes in Scott’s slouch, the way his elbow is braced against the arm held across his belly.  John’s the one who gets migraines, but the way Scott’s pinching the bridge of his nose speaks to a wicked tension headache.  “Scott, what is it?”

Scott’s exhale is loud in the cool air.  It’s so late it’s almost early, the air cold enough that John can see the plume of Scott’s breath.  “We’ve got a lead.  But it’s about to evaporate, and I know Captain Casey, she’d want to do this by the book, full inter-agency cooperation. There’s protocol and everything.”

Even drowning in exhaustion and emotion, John’s good at joining dots.  “Too slow?”

Scott nods, his shoulders rolling back and straightening up.  “Our source says he’s about to vanish.  We’ve got one shot at getting the guy who did this to Alan….John?”

The engine is still warm under the fingers John trails over the hood as he walks around to the passenger side.  “What are we waiting for?  Let’s go.”

* * *

 

Scott’s going to be in so much trouble if anyone at the station catches wind of this. 

Brains, aka Dr. Hiram K Hackenbacker - an _engineer,_  of all things - had barely let Scott introduce himself before agreeing to tell him everything. His only request was protection - not only for him, but for the others who were only doing this because of a debt owed to the Mechanic.

Alan included.

Brains is too smart to think Scott can guarantee that, but he takes Scott’s solemn promise as word of God, and with no small amount of guilt, runs down what he knows.

It’s so much worse than Scott had thought.

For one, the Mechanic’s a known entity already, though he’s never been more than a rumor. Scott’s heard the name thrown around the bullpen more than once, but he’d never put much thought into it. He’s not a detective, he’s patrol, and so most of this is above his pay-grade.

But they have a lead, a real lead, and a clear look into the crime empire that the Mechanic appears to have single-handedly built. The people he’s got working for him only do so out of fear, because the Mechanic has threatened them into obedience and if Brains is right, they aren’t empty threats. Everything Scott hears about this just makes him more curious about how exactly Alan got mixed up in this, but Brains doesn’t know the details.

 _“I’m just the guy b-b-building the cars,”_  Brains had said, shaking his head. The guy seems pretty honest. Scott wants to ask what the Mechanic has on him, but there will be time for that later.

Brains has been with the Mechanic for years and knows his moving routine inside out. It’s efficient and quick, and Scott’s impressed despite himself, but Brains can lead them to where the Mechanic is waiting. They can get him there.

“If he hasn’t already left, that is,” Brains says.

John shouldn’t be here. Scott knows that, but he’s here anyway, because Scott needs him to be. He’s on his phone, typing out a text, and he looks exhausted, but he’s here and Scott knows it’s probably selfish of him, but he’s glad.

“Who are you texting?” he asks.

“Gordon,” John says, not looking up. “I forgot to tell him Virgil’s okay earlier, and Virgil wants him to bring his charger.”

“Left here,” Brains says from the backseat.

“How’s Grandma?” Scott asks, taking a left. They’re going through downtown now, and they’re well outside of Scott’s usual patrol area. He’s going to be in so much trouble.

“I don’t know,” John admits. “I don't think Gordon's awake to get the message.”

“Can’t say I blame him,” Scott says. “He looked pretty wrecked when I left earlier.”

"Penny's still there. I'll check in later, but as far as the homefront goes, for now I'm considering no news to be good news."

“Another left,” Brains says. Scott turns onto a one-way and stops at the light. He barely knows this area. It makes him uneasy.

“Where are we going?” he asks, glancing at Brains in the rearview mirror.

Brains sighs tiredly. “We have to p-pack up shop every now and again. He had some others scope out some n-n-new places a while back. One was compromised, but this one wasn’t.”

“That doesn’t answer my question, Brains,” Scott says, barely keeping his irritation out of his voice. Virgil’s words keep echoing in his head and he grits his teeth.

“There’s an old b-b-building down near an old mall,” Brains says. “It’s big and isolated enough. The Mechanic knows the guy who owns it.”

“What’s the address?” John asks curiously.

Brains doesn’t hesitate to give it to them. Scott doesn’t know it, but Kayo’s sharp intake of breath tells him she sure as hell does. That can’t be a good sign.

“Kayo?” he says.

“I know that address,” Kayo says, and her voice is low and angry. “I know who owns it, too.”

Scott almost doesn’t need her to say it, but she does anyway.

“It’s my uncle’s. It’s the Hood’s.”

* * *

Her car is not a large car, an old ‘84 Mustang. It’s nothing like a classic, it’s just old. Four people take up all four seats, and Kayo’s uncomfortably aware of the presence of a civilian in their midst. Two cops, one criminal, and one bystander, and the four of them parked within spitting distance of one of her uncle’s properties. There’ll be guards, there’ll be dogs. There might be people who know her face, though she tries not to think about that.

Because if their intel is good, there  _also_  might be the person responsible for one of the more major criminal enterprises in the city, complete with boosted luxury cars, assorted juveniles being coerced with money or drugs or whatever else, and a whole lot of cash being circulated through the whole process.

It’s no wonder this trail has come leading back to the Hood, or at least to one of his properties. But the interesting question is whether this is a partnership of equals, or whether there’s an imbalance. Whether the Mechanic is a lackey or a player in his own right. If he’s a rival, then her uncle will be looking to force him out. If he’s a lackey, the Mechanic may be looking to challenge the Hood’s own robust empire.

They’ve been sitting in the car long enough that the respiration of four bodies has started to fog up the windows, and Kayo swipes a hand irritably across hers, peers out into the darkness. In seat beside her, Brains sits quietly. In the seat in front, Scott’s brother does the same, though Kayo can hear the faint, rapid tap of his thumbs on the touchscreen of his phone, the blue of the screen the only light in the darkness.

Of Scott’s brothers, so far Kayo’s only met Virgil and Gordon, and Gordon only just tonight. Virgil she’s come across once or twice before, solely by merit of the fact that he works so much, which is coincidentally the thing Scott complains about most. It’s Gordon’s temper she hears about, and by now she knows better than to get Scott started about Alan. But she’s not sure she knows anything about John, least of all why the hell he’s  _here_.

Currently, he’s just in between her and the passenger’s side door.

“Right,” she starts, and claps her hands on the headrests of the two seats in front of her. She gives an extra tap on John’s. “You, let me out. Either the Mechanic’s in there or he isn’t, but if he  _is_ , then he’s gonna be wondering where the hell his engineer is. That’s our in. A race got blown tonight, and if there’s as much money in this game as Pointdexter—”

“Brains,” John corrects from the front seat, and Kayo’s fingers tighten just slightly on the leather of the headrest behind him.

“—as  _Brains_  says there is, then he’s going to need to set up something new, fast. There are people putting  _big_  money on these races. He’s lost about half a dozen cars, at least that many drivers, if the rest of 'em aren’t running scared. He’ll be looking. I’ve got a car. I’m a damn good driver. If we can get someone on the inside of this thing—”

“ _Nope_.” Scott’s let her get this far, but now he turns and gives her a hard stare. “Nothin’ doing, rookie, it was one thing when I thought we could catch this guy moving hot cars into a new space, get some decent surveillance, call it in and report it. But this is clearly an  _operation_  and it’s clearly on a larger scale than you, me, and the peanut gallery can deal with. If this is connected to your  _uncle_?  _That_  is  _way_  over our heads. We’re not clear to—”

“My uncle owns the property. He owns about  _half_  the property in this part of town. It might be that’s all it is. But it also might be that this is a line we could use to hook a  _big_  fish.”

Scott’s jaw clenches slightly. “Yeah, a big fish who knew you when you were still a small fry. Even if you  _can_  get on the inside with the Mechanic—”

“I can.”

“It’s too dangerous.”

Kayo growls and kicks the back of John’s seat. “Let me out,” she orders, but knows better than to expect that this will happen. “Just let me go have a look around. I’ll take the Brainiac, that’s my in. He tells the Mechanic that I came by the old shop after the crash, looking for work. Told him I wouldn’t take no for an answer, took him on a joy ride around town to prove I’m serious. He didn’t have a choice but to bring me back to the boss.”

They’ve only been together a few months, but Kayo knows Scott well enough to know the meaning of the way his eyes narrow slightly. He’s thinking about it, in spite of himself.

“I’ll do it,” says a quiet voice beside her. “P-please. I want to help.”

And in the front seat, Scott heaves a sigh.


	6. Chapter 6

Gordon’s so, _so_ tired. He’s leaning against the wall outside the apartment, trying to talk himself into walking into it. Penny’s on the other side of the door, but so is Grandma, and he needs to pull himself together before he can go inside. He has to, for Grandma’s sake, but also for his own.

Grandma’s strong. She’s the strongest woman he’s ever known, and Gordon knows without a doubt that if he went in there falling apart, she’d try to hold him up. She shouldn’t have to. He can’t put that on her. She’s sick, and she’s in pain, and Gordon needs to be able to speak clearly and calmly. He needs to be able to tell her what’s happened without breaking down. He won’t hide it from her, he won’t lie to her. But she doesn’t need to be worried about him.

He takes a deep breath and pushes off the wall. He needs to just do this, because the longer he waits, the worse it’ll get.

Penny’s with Grandma in her room, a spread of cards between them. Neither of them are paying attention to the game anymore; they’re both staring at him. Penny’s face is apprehensive and cautious, and Grandma’s gaze is sharp, seeing more than he wants her to, like always. Gordon averts his own eyes.

“Gordon?” Penny says, and he lifts his eyes to meet hers. “You didn’t say much over the phone.”

Yeah, he hadn’t. He’d let them know Alan was in a car accident and stable, and that he was heading back to the apartment. He shakes his head.

“Alan’s okay,” he says. “Or, well, he will be. Probably. It was close, but he’s stable. John’s still with him.”

“What happened?” Grandma asks, and her tone indicates she’s not going to be deterred.

Gordon takes a breath. He can do this. He can hold it together, long enough to get through this, and make sure Grandma’s okay and not just pretending to be. He can.

“Alan’s been street racing,” he says, and doesn’t look at Grandma. He doesn’t want to see her face, doesn’t want to see the pain or anger Alan’s caused. “I don’t know why or for how long - Scott thinks there’s something else at play here. I don’t know. But there was an accident, someone took a corner too fast or something, and he went off-road, and took a bunch of cars with him, Alan included.”

Penny inhales sharply, and he can’t look at her anymore, either, and just looks down at the cards before continuing. Calm, clear, just a run down of his injuries.  _You can handle this, Gordon._

“He had to have surgery to take care of some internal bleeding. His shoulder’s dislocated, he’s got a few broken ribs, and some damage to his organs. He’s probably got whiplash. He has a concussion, but he had a helmet on, and it—.”

His voice breaks, and  _damnit_ , he’s already done this. He’s already been through the ‘what-ifs’ and he’s already had to take a few moments outside the hospital to calm himself down, and he doesn’t need to do this again, right now, in front of Grandma and Penny. He’s a paramedic, damnit, he sees these things all the time. He can handle it.

He takes a steadying breath. “Yeah. He had a helmet on.”

“Thank God,” Grandma says, and Gordon almost falls apart right there. Her voice is steady, but there’s a definite note of worry in it. He hates this. He hates that this has happened.

“You said John’s at the hospital with him,” Penny says, her tone soothing. Gordon wants to bask in it, but he just nods, still staring at the cards. They’re starting to get blurry, and Gordon’s so frustrated with himself he’s going to scream.

“Yeah,” he says. “Scott had to go back to the station, he has to write up a report for the scene and all that. And Virgil—”

Gordon has to stop, because as far as he’s heard, no one’s heard from Virgil. John had said he’d left to find Alan earlier, but that was hours ago, and given what’s happened to Alan, this radio silence from Virgil can’t be good. Gordon can’t push back the thought that something’s happened to Virgil, too.

He doesn’t want to worry Grandma further, but no doubt she already knows something’s up, as the pause goes on further, so he breathes through the worry. He’s not going to lie to her.

“I don’t know where Virgil is,” Gordon admits. “He’s not answering his phone.”

“Oh,” Penny says, almost like she hadn’t meant to. Gordon closes his eyes, because he’s too close to the edge. He’s way too close.

“Gordon,” Grandma says softly, and Gordon flinches.

He hears someone move, and seconds later, he’s being pulled into a hug. It’s Penny, he can tell, would know the scent of her shampoo anywhere, know the way her body fits against his.

And he breaks.

* * *

Penelope is not a natural caretaker.

Gordon is. So is his grandmother. She loves it about them both, and has ever since she first found herself folded into this peculiar, remarkable little family. But with the pair of them both relatively incapacitated, it’s not like she has any choice but to step up to the task..

She ushers Gordon into the shower, once he’s pulled himself most of the way back together, her moral support like scaffolding to help hold him up. When she returns to Grandma Tracy, she's only lucky to catch it as the old woman shifts in bed, and sends a little pill clattering onto the floor. Thus Penelope discovers the 20mg of codeine that John _thought_ he’d given his grandmother, but which has instead been stashed away in the bed sheets. This is administered along with a healthy dose of Penelope’s towering disapproval and a chipped mug of mint tea, which Grandma Tracy accepts with surprising meekness.

Ruth is asleep and Penelope is just closing her door, by the time Gordon stumbles out of the shower in the bathroom at the end of the hallway. This has run long enough that the hot water had a chance to run cold, and he’s shivering as she sends him directly to bed, promises to be along shortly after, once she’s tidied away Grandma’s empty mug, and straightened up the kitchen just a bit. She kisses him lightly and turns the corner into the kitchen.

The Tracy’s apartment is at least two bedrooms too small for the six people who share it, but technically only three to four of them ever occupy it at any given time. Their grandmother, obviously, is a fixture. Her room is the master bedroom, with its small half bath and lofty queen bed. Her bedside table is neatly stacked with a rotating offering of library books and the crossword pages pilfered from newspapers in assorted breakrooms. There’s a small TV in the corner, atop a dresser neatly filled with her washed folded clothing. If everything else in the boys’ apartment is on the shabbier side, they’ve all gone above and beyond to ensure that their grandmother’s room is a little shrine of comfort and security.

In the bedroom across the hall there’s a bunkbed, double on the bottom, single on top. There’s a curtain wrapped around the top bunk, and nominally she knows that this is what passes for Alan’s private space. The bottom bunk plays host to a rotation of the rest of his brothers, though for Penelope’s part, she’s mostly claimed Gordon as her own, and most of the way moved him into her own place. And with the way Virgil’s shifts workout, twenty-four hours on to forty-eight hours off, he usually manages to sleep at least half his nights at the firestation. Scott and John have both finally achieved enough seniority in their respective fields to have their choice of shift, and most often they work opposite each other, and in the cases when it doesn’t work out, the couch in their living room folds out into a futon.

Somehow they manage. Despite the fact that it seems ridiculous and chaotic and impossible at first blush, the five of them have it more or less down to at least the semblance of a science. It’s not ideal, but they make it work. They all deserve far better than a place like this to call home, but for whatever reason, instead it’s this terrible, shitty little apartment with its particle board cabinets and leaky fixtures, paper thin walls and threadbare carpet.

And Penelope feels more welcome here than she ever had, even in her childhood home, the palatial manor that she’d left behind in England. It’s more like a home than the sprawling London flat she’d abandoned, taking with her only what fit into a single suitcase. Not even Gordon knows the truth about what she’d walked away from, nor why she’d walked away from it. Truthfully, she doesn’t know what he’d think if he found out.

It doesn’t matter, anyway. She’s here now, and even in light of the circumstances, there’s nowhere else she’d rather be.

The dishes she finds in the sink have already been washed, just left to drain and dry. Shabby as the place is, it’s also kept immaculately, obsessively clean. She rinses the mug and leaves it to join the rest of the dishes, and exiting the kitchen, steps lightly past Grandma Tracy’s door, pushing open the door to the other bedroom with a soft whine of the hinges. It’s dark inside, but for the screen of Gordon’s phone, still glowing bright from where it’s fallen on the floor.

But he must’ve only just dropped it, because she can hear him softly snoring. Approaching, as her eyes adjust, she can see him sprawled on his stomach, one arm hanging loosely off the bed in vague but unsuccessful pursuit of his phone, interrupted midway by the sheer force of exhaustion. She picks this up and plugs it in, glancing only briefly at the message to make sure it isn’t important—just a text from John with the news that Virgil’s been found, and has been ensconced at the hospital with Alan. There’s no mention of when he and Scott will be home, but she’ll check in with him later.

For now, she gives Gordon a gentle shove, nudges and prods him just barely back to the edge of wakefulness, just enough that she can coax and cajole him towards the middle of the bed, and properly beneath the blankets. This accomplished, she resists the urge to climb into bed beside him, for the purpose of just holding him the whole night through, whether he’d know she’s there or not. Instead she brushes her fingertips lightly through his hair, kisses him gently, and murmurs an unheard promise about how everything will be okay.

Then she leaves him, and returns to the living room with her phone and a borrowed crossword puzzle, to wait up until she's no longer needed.


	7. Chapter 7

Her service weapon and her badge have both been entrusted to her partner, who isn’t happy about the plan, but admits that it’s a good one. It had been his brother who’d been her unexpected ally, who’d taken her side in the argument, and made the salient point that Kayo’s involvement on the inside track of the street racing circuit might just prevent any other kids like Alan from getting hurt, or worse. This is going to happen again anyway, and this might be the only chance they get to make sure they can stop it.

More surprising even than John’s support had been Scott’s eventual, grudging agreement.

So now she walks through the front door of the warehouse with her head high and her shoulders back. Brains walks in front of her and she has to slow her pace in order to stay behind him, because her impulse is to stride out in front. It was her idea, after all.

At the far end of the warehouse, the Mechanic waits. She can feel him staring at her. Her teeth clench slightly, but she keeps her head high. She doesn’t flinch as she approaches, doesn’t shrink beneath his gaze, though he hides his eyes behind mirrored orange sunglasses. He’s dressed all in black, leather jacket, jeans, gloves on his hands and heavy soled boots. His hair is dark, shaved close to his scalp, patterns cut into it, razor sharp lines. He’s _built_ beneath the jacket, Kayo can tell just from the way he holds himself, but shorter than Brains. If he’s not carrying a gun, she’ll eat her badge, or would if she hadn’t left it in the car, entrusted to her partner.

And she does trust her partner. Likewise, she can tell that he trusts _her_ , and more than anything she wants to live up to that trust. Scott’s the reason she’s doing this, anyway.

She’s just not sure why Scott _is_ the reason. A little voice at the back of her brain keeps saying it’s because he’s her partner, but it’s more than that. Loyalty was something her family always preached, but her loyalty to her family has been stripped and scoured away, abraded by all the wrong they’d done—not just to her personally, but to the world at large. Apparently the void left by cutting all ties to her background has been yearning for something to fill it. Kayo’s never had a partner before, never had _this_ particular relationship with someone. She considers Scott a friend, but it’s more than just friendship. She feels a bone-deep devotion to him that she hadn’t expected. She hadn’t known what sort of a police officer she’d make—half the reason she’d gone into law enforcement was just in deliberate defiance of her own legacy—but she’d hoped to find herself drawn to something like a cause. Hoped to find something to fill the void where her loyalties had used to lie.

It’s a big, complicated feeling and it fills her up, fuels her, and fires her purpose like clay in a kiln, hardens it and makes it whole. It’s the reason she’s taken a few of her own days off work, in the name of bringing an end to the man who’s brought harm to her partner’s family. It’s the reason she can be here, and be unafraid, as she finally approaches the Mechanic, who stares at her for a few impassive seconds, before he looks to Brains, impatient and expectant. His voice is deep, oddly muffled when he growls, “Who the hell is this?”

Kayo’s got an answer of her own before Brains can so much as squeak.

“I’m just someone,” she starts, and squares her shoulders, hopes that her brashness and her confidence don’t tip her hand, give her away before the game’s even begun, “who knows the word on the street is that you’re looking for drivers.”

* * *

Brains is glad that Kayo’s the one spinning lies. Somehow, the mirrored lenses always seemed to reflect back a truer version of yourself than you wanted the Mechanic to see.

It’s how Brains had found himself in this mess in the first place.

He’s still not sure that the Mechanic is buying Kayo’s story, but at least he’s not outright angry. Brains is so nervous waiting for the explosion he almost misses his cue to nod furiously when the Mechanic glances over to check Kayo’s point about taking Brains on a joyride.

Kayo looks relaxed in his presence, the slight arrogance Brains had come to identify with the real street rats, the ones who’d pick his pockets if it wasn’t for his ties to the big boss. Brains himself can barely breathe as the Mechanic stares at her, impassive and unmoving.

“Bring me a car,” he growls finally, dismissing them with a flick of his hand. “Then we’ll talk.”

Brains almost yanks Kayo away, desperate to get deeper into the maze of makeshift workshops that had already sprung up in the new shop. He needed to talk to her without eavesdroppers. “We’ve got a problem,” he manages to hiss with only one false start; Brains could see at a glance these weren’t racing pits.

“Chopshops,” Kayo murmurs, running a knowing look over the VIN cloning setup, the industrial grinders, all the accoutrements of slicing cars up in all the ways that couldn’t be traced.

Brains nods tightly. He’d seen this twice before. “He’s cleaning house.”

Kayo’s slight inhale told him she knew exactly what that meant.

* * *

“I’m giving her another ten minutes and then I’m calling it.”

Next to him, John sniggers softly, little more than an exhalation in the dim quiet. “You said that ten minutes ago. You’re not calling this in.”

Scott drags his gaze away from the door he’s been staring at for a good twenty minutes now to stare at his brother instead. “You sound pretty sure of yourself there.”

John’s messing with his phone, texting or Tindr or Candy Crush, Scott can’t tell. He’s set the screen down as dark as it will go, but it’s still bright in the darkness, casting his brother’s cheekbone’s into even starker relief. “You won’t call it in because right now you trust her a lot more than you trust the rest of your entire department not to screw this up.” John looks up at that, a humourless smile pulling at the corner of his mouth. “And you _really_ don’t want to screw this up.”

The words _it’s what dad would have done_ are like acid on his tongue, and even a year ago Scott would have spat them at John. But he’s gotten good at keeping that anger deep down where it won’t show. “What are you doing, anyway?” he asks instead, jerking his chin at John’s phone.

John’s thumbs are already flying again. “Something this big, moving late model cars? I’ve heard enough dispatch calls to know they use hackers to clear the plates. And hackers,” he adds, pausing long enough to point at a discreet black box sitting on top of a fuse box near the door Kayo had vanished through twenty-two minutes ago now. “Need wifi. I’m just trying a few passwords….”

Scott scoffs despite himself. “Somehow I don’t think anything the Hood’s involved in will use ‘password’ as a password.” In cup holder by the handbrake, Scott’s own phone rattles, the screen flashing too bright. Kayo’s message was terse, more code than words. “Round back.”

John’s craning his neck to read upside down. “Can’t get any plainer than that.”

Scott’s scowling as he turns the motor and eases them around the lot.

* * *

 

“So, I need a car,” Kayo tells him, as soon as she’s settled in the back seat of her own. Brains has been ushered into the car ahead of her, secured in the backseat. While he still looks pale and startled and a little bit shocked that he’s been permitted to walk out of the warehouse, Scott doesn’t read him as anything like a threat. He doesn’t know what they’re going to _do_ with him, but for the moment he’s more interested in what Kayo has to say.

“ _This_ is a car,” John offers from the passenger’s seat, though he doesn’t look up, his gaze still fixed to his phone. When the battery had started to die, Scott had been grateful for the Mustang’s age and the lack of a car charger and hoped it would put a stop to whatever John was getting into—but John had just fished in his pocket and pulled out a backup battery pack. There’s an intensity to him that Scott’s starting to dislike, a metastasizing fixation that needs to be nipped in the bud and aggressively curtailed, before John can get close enough to get himself into trouble. He shouldn’t even be here in the first place. Scott should’ve done what Virgil wanted him to, and driven him straight home. By Scott’s count, John’s been awake for well beyond twenty-four hours now, and there’s a slight loopiness creeping into his overall manner that belies his need for sleep.

Kayo has known John for only about an hour and change, and thus does not know him nearly well enough to read this statement as anything but childishly facile, and she rolls her eyes. “I need a car I can _steal_ , so I can prove to this guy that I’m willing to boost a ride to get a spot on his roster.”

“Oh.”

Scott grimaces as he brings them out of the parking lot and back onto the backstreets that will get them out of the seedier part of town. The sun is rising over the city, and even if it doesn’t feel like it, life goes on. “…I think we need to draw a line here,” he starts, “I can’t let you steal a goddamn car.”

“…Well. What if she didn’t have to _steal_ it, exactly?”

This is John again, and in different company and different circumstances Scott would reach over and slap him in the back of the head, because he can already guess his brother’s train of thought. Instead he has to settle for a low, warning growl.

“ _No_ , John.”

John shrugs. “I’m just saying: we _have_ a car.”

Kayo is immediately skeptical, and Scott knows exactly why. She’s still new enough in her accquaintance with John that she’s cautiously tactful as she declines, “…Uh. No offense, but it’d need to be something a _little_ more…uh…up-market…than the beater I’ve seen your brother drive into work. I’ve gotta make an impression, here.”

“He doesn’t mean _that_ car,” Scott grumbles. “But it doesn’t matter what car he _does_ mean, because A), it’s _Virgil’s_ , B) it _was_ Mom’s, and C) it doesn’t have a goddamn _engine_.”

“ _This_ car has an engine.”

John’s probably the smartest out of Scott’s brothers. He’s definitely the most educated. But he knows jack _shit_ about cars, and Scott shakes his head, exasperated as he insists, “Cars aren’t _modular_. You can’t just swap parts out of them one to one—”

From the back seat there’s a faintly stammered, “A- _actually_ —”, but Scott removes his eyes from the road just long enough to direct a deathglare into the rearview mirror, and silence falls. In the passenger seat John shrugs again and finally disengages from the screen of his phone.

“This was a mistake,” Scott announces from the driver’s seat, and then takes a deep breath “I was emotional. I was angry about what happened to my brother. I jumped the gun, and I didn’t think about what we might be getting into. _I’m_ off-duty. Kayo, you’re a rookie. Brains is a _criminal_. John, you’re a _civilian_ —”

“I am _not_ —”

Scott cuts him off. “You’re not a _cop_. Right now, neither am I, and I don’t know what the hell I was thinking. For all we know our little brother is still unconscious in the hospital, and _that_ should be what we care about right now. I was wrong. We’re gonna head back to where we should’ve _stayed_ , find something and somewhere to eat, sit everybody down and regroup. Text Virgil. Let him know we’re on our way back.” He pauses, and then ruefully adds, “Tell him I didn’t do anything stupid.”

"But not for lack of trying," John mutters under his breath, such that only Scott can hear him, even as he obediently taps out a message to their brother, and they turn away from the rough part of town, and back towards the safety of the city center.


End file.
